Guidelines for planting, a calendar of gardening events in the San Antonio area, advice on just about everything related to gardening, and most of all answers to your gardening questions are all available on this site.

Highlights plants that perform well for Texans. In addition to tips on selecting your plants and getting the best out of your selections, the site also provides info on nurseries that carry these (sometimes unusual) plants.

While not written specifically for South Texas, this website and its members provide advice and assistance in everything from choosing plants to identifying pests to picking the source of your seeds and plants.

What is 'Permaculture'?

Permaculture is "an ecological design system for sustainability in all aspects of human endeavor."

Permaculture embraces practices and methods to make an endeavor, such as a garden, sustainable for the long-run and as self-sufficient as possible.

Welcome to Gardening in South Texas

Gardening in South Texas

When searching the catalog for books about gardening, your search terms will depend on the type of gardening you’re interested in—organic, flower, houseplants, etc. (In the case of houseplants use “house plants” or “indoor gardening”)

Favorite Gardening in South Texas Books

Written in a conversational style familiar to his radio listeners, Welsh aims to be a practical guide for gardeners new and experienced. He wants readers to have fun with both his book and their gardening.

A month-by-month guide to gardening. Welsh includes information about garden design as well as plant care of trees, shrubs, flowers, lawns, herbs, fruit and vegetables.

Full of in-depth information and gardening tips, this resource contains the latest information on organic gardening and native plants, as well as regional-specific tips for each type of plant in the garden and creative suggestions for hardscaping.

Each chapter in this sourcebook is devoted to one of Texas's 12 gardening regions, describing each region's climate and soil type, and interspersed throughout are money-saving tips and professional landscaping advice on plant selection and garden maintenance. Containing all the information needed to create and maintain a healthy and beautiful Texas garden, this handbook is a great reference for any avid gardener.-- From publisher description.

With full-color illustrations of each and every plant, Clausen introduces versatile and visually appealing plants that deer usually choose not to eat. Clausen includes design tips and companion plants for her 50 chosen annuals, perennials, bulbs, ferns, grasses, and shrubs.

Herbs for Texas zeroes in on nearly 150 herbs suited to Texas and Southwestern gardens. It offers detailed information about each plant's possible uses in your landscaping, cooking and medicine chest. The authors even include the occasional recipe!

Garrett also sets forth the basics of organic gardening, including pest control.

The authors explore the American South’s gardening heritage from the sisters of Native American practice to the formality and order of the French and the orange blossoms and Spanish-daggers of Spain. But the emphasis is on rediscovering southern heirloom plants and designing your own garden.

Does the idea of sitting back with a cold drink while watching hummingbirds or butterflies dancing in your yard appeal to you? Choose the right plants and you can provide both food and shelter for native animals which will attract butterflies, birds and other wildlife to your yard.

Houston and El Paso offer very different growing conditions and challenges. Texas wildscapes acknowledges this truth by offering plants appropriate to the diverse regions of Texas. Color photographs of various types of gardens are offered to spark your creativity.

Gardening Philosophies

A fascinating look at the founding fathers from the unique and intimate perspective of their lives as gardeners, plantsmen, and farmers. For the founding fathers, gardening, agriculture, and botany were elemental passions, as deeply ingrained in their characters as their belief in liberty for the nation they were creating.

Andrea Wulf reveals for the first time this aspect of the revolutionary generation. She describes how, even as British ships gathered off Staten Island, George Washington wrote his estate manager about the garden at Mount Vernon; how a tour of English gardens renewed Thomas Jefferson's and John Adams's faith in their fledgling nation; how a trip to the great botanist John Bartram's garden helped the delegates of the Constitutional Congress break their deadlock; and why James Madison is the forgotten father of American environmentalism.

These and other stories reveal a guiding but previously overlooked ideology of the American Revolution. Founding Gardeners adds depth and nuance to our understanding of the American experiment, and provides us with a portrait of the founding fathers as they've never before been seen

In addition to practical how-to essays such as "Methods of Natural Pest Insect Control" and "Composting - Making Trash into Treasure", they include articles about new and different gardening efforts around the country.

GreenerChoices.org, launched on Earth Day 2005 by Consumers Union, the non-profit publisher of Consumer Reports, is a Web-based initiative to inform, engage, and empower consumers about environmentally-friendly products and practices.